Los Angeles, Calif. (April 15, 2004) – Federal charges filed by several employees of Albertson’s grocery chain who face retaliatory fines for refusal to engage in illegal “sympathy strike” activity have forced union officials to waffle. Nevertheless, retaliation continues against many workers that refused to obey the illegal strike order.

Teamsters Local 952 union officials have been socking employees with confiscatory fines –$1,600 per employee – simply for the act of following the union’s own “no strike” contract with Albertson’s. The targeted employees had simply continued to report to work during the recent statewide grocery strike ordered against Albertson’s, Vons, and Ralphs by the United Food and Commercial Workers union.

With the help of National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys, Juan Saldana and several other Albertson’s distribution center employees filed unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) after Teamsters union officials imposed $1,600 fines for refusal to abandon their jobs.

After the charges were filed, union officials dropped the discipline for some employees – but then inexplicably reinstated the fines. Other employees are seeing their fines dropped as a result of the charges.

Saldana and his coworkers allege that Teamsters Local 952 officials unlawfully failed to inform workers of their rights to refrain from formal union membership and to object to paying for the union’s nonrepresentational activities, such as electoral politics. The charges state that union officials also misled workers by telling them they had to sign automatic dues deduction cards, pay full union dues, and remain full members as a condition of employment.

Furthermore, Teamsters union officials told Saldana that they would “have his union card pulled” and that he would be fired if he refused to violate the union’s own “no-strike” policy, and strike against his employer.

“Teamsters union officials have been waging an ugly and illegal campaign of retaliation against workers who decided to honor their commitments to their families and their employer by refusing to walk off the job,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation.

In November 2003, Saldana and his coworkers learned from sources independent of the union of their rights to refrain from formal union membership and be forced to pay no more than the union’s proven collective bargaining costs. Once the workers resigned their formal memberships, union officials again misled them by informing the workers that their resignations would have to be renewed annually.

The actions of Teamsters union officials violated worker protections recognized in the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Communications Workers v. Beck, a case argued and won by Foundation attorneys. Under the Beck ruling, workers may not be compelled to pay dues beyond the union’s proven collective bargaining costs, and they are entitled to an independent audit of union expenditures.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, assists thousands of employees in more than 250 cases nationwide per year.